Capturing Today (TimeShifters Book 2) by Jessica Keller, Jess Evander

have noticed last time because we can understand each other. Even when we’re speaking different languages.”
    “Wait.” Curiosity overrides my momentary frustration with him, and I take a few steps closer. “Please tell me you speak English.”
    He shuts his eyes and shakes his head but is unsuccessful at hiding his grin. “I’m from Chicago too, remember?”
    “Yes. But this is weird. Why didn’t anyone tell me that before?”
    “I guess you didn’t need to know.”
    My nails bite into my palms. You didn’t need to know . This is exactly what’s wrong with the Shifters. Why not tell me everything? Why hold back pieces of information? I clearly needed to know. I could have been studying other cultures and world history when I was home. This is the kind of stuff that made me speak with Erik—at least he was willing to talk. He promised answers.
    Any other time I’d pick a fight with Michael about this but not today. Not when he’s morphing into a half man, half zombie hybrid.  Maybe he’s paler than I remember because he’s been inside more than usual on this mission?
     He rubs the heel of his hand against his forehead. “We shifted to the Great War because we have every reason to be prepared to be here.”
    “The Great War.” My mind clicks through everything I’ve read and studied during my time at home. “That’s World War One, correct?”
    He nods.
    Inwardly I happy dance because I wouldn’t have known that last time around. Perhaps my days of purgatory in the library haven’t been a total loss. “How long have you been here?”
    “A few months.” He scratches the side of his head. “Or is it …” His eyes slide closed again, and he lets a lot of air out through his nostrils. “I sort of lost track of things in the last week or so.”
    “That doesn’t sound like the Michael I know.”
    “There’s been a lot going on.” He shrugs. “This war is, for lack of a better word, bad.” Finally, he meets my eyes, and the look in his makes me want to rip my heart out. It’s so hollow, like hope’s not even an option. “There’s so much death. Did you know that seventy-five percent of soldiers who take a bullet to the arm die because of it during this war. Seventy-five percent.”
    “That’s a lot.”
    “Antibiotics haven’t been discovered yet, and hygiene here is basically nonexistent. The smallest wound becomes a breeding ground for infection. They are dying from things that we don’t even bat an eye at in our time.” He pushes his hand into his chest, as if he’s fighting heartburn. “They’re still trying to charge each other on the battlefield while the other side plows them down with machine guns. Hundreds of men die to gain two or three feet. It’s insanity. And I can’t stop them.”
    He drops his head into his hands. “I don’t know why I’m here. Usually I know—I sense. But I don’t.” He fists his hands into his hair and pulls. Hard. “And I can’t help them. Not really.”
    My stomach clenches. I want to do something to take Michael’s pain away. But I can’t. There’s nothing I can do to make what he’s experienced better.
    “You helped Samuel yesterday.”
    He tips his head to make eye contact again. His eyebrows gather together. “He’s dead.”
    “He could have known incredible pain at the end. You saved him from that.”
    Michael laughs once, but it holds no humor. “Yeah. By cheating.” He rests his elbow on his knee and then jams his thumb and pointer finger over his eyes. “But I can’t find it within me to feel bad about that. I only use Keleusma stuff if someone is passed out and it’s life or death—Samuel was different. He saved me when I first shifted. I owed him a peaceful last minute.” He sighs. “No. I owed him better than that.”
    What can I say?
    Nothing.
    Michael deserves better than a there-there pat on the shoulder. I won’t cheapen whatever pain he’s sorting through by telling him he shouldn’t feel that way.